This project focuses on the environmental degradation and forced lifestyle changes experienced by local communities in northeastern and southeastern Turkey as a result of large-scale dam construction. Implemented within the framework of state water policies, the dams built in the Tigris and Çoruh valleys have submerged ancient settlements, religious structures, and numerous cultural heritage sites dating back 5,000–10,000 years. Beyond the destruction of historical landscapes, these projects have significantly altered ecological systems by changing microclimates, reducing plant and animal populations, and reshaping entire habitats.

The social consequences are equally profound. More than 20,000 people from diverse ethnic backgrounds—including Turkish, Kurdish, Arab, Georgian, and Laz communities—have been forced to abandon their homes and agricultural lands. Fertile river valleys that once supported farming and animal husbandry were lost, accelerating migration to larger cities in search of employment opportunities. This displacement has disrupted traditional livelihoods and undermined community cohesion. The transition from rural life to modern urban environments poses a threat not only to tangible heritage, such as ancient sites and monuments, but also to intangible cultural elements, including languages, rituals, and local customs that comprise the social fabric of the region.

In this context, the project also draws attention to the symbolic dimension of water, evoking the myth of Noah’s Flood, which resurfaces here through human intervention. The dialectic of the “presence of water” and the “absence of water” highlights how landscapes, societies, and collective memories are transformed under the pressures of development. This interplay reveals humanity’s recurring cycle of creation and destruction, exposing the environmental and cultural consequences of uncontrolled interventions in nature to meet basic needs.

Across Syria, the visible landscape reflects not only large-scale destruction but also the fragile boundary between loss and persistence. Since the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War in 2011, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and millions displaced. Today, the impact of this prolonged conflict is evident not only in the physical devastation of cities but also in how everyday life continues within conditions of absence.

Recent political developments, including Bashar al-Assad’s departure and the emergence of Ahmed al-Sharaa as a central political figure, suggest a potential transition to a new phase. However, beyond these shifts, the country reveals a subtler, less visible reality shaped by daily practices of survival and adaptation.

In urban streets, displacement camps, and temporary settlements, children constitute one of the most visible social groups. Growing up amid destruction, many of them engage in play within ruined environments, transforming these spaces into sites of temporary normalcy. Their presence reactivates abandoned areas, filling otherwise empty spaces with movement and sound. At the same time, the gradual return of families—particularly from Türkiye—signals a cautious re-emergence of daily life, as returnees are reintroduced into unstable living conditions, where past and present coexist in uncertain ways.

Uncertainty remains a defining condition across the country. Yet rather than functioning solely as a force of fragmentation, it also produces new forms of proximity and coexistence. In this context, contemporary life in Syria can be understood as a process unfolding within the tension between destruction and continuity—where traces of the past persist, and everyday practices sustain the possibility of a future.

Lake Urmia, once one of the largest salt lakes in the world, has lost nearly 80% of its surface area over the past two decades. The combined effects of climate change, dams blocking water inflow, and intensive irrigation have caused a dramatic drop in the lake’s water levels and led to a severe ecological crisis.

Once home to flamingos and other migratory birds, Lake Urmia has gradually turned into a barren salt flat. The boats that once carried visitors across its turquoise waters now sit motionless on dry, cracked ground — silent witnesses to a vanished ecosystem. Abandoned resorts line its shores, and the salt carried by the wind has destroyed nearby farmland, changing the lives and livelihoods of thousands of people.

This environmental disaster is a stark reminder of how uncontrolled human intervention in nature can upset fragile ecological balances and threaten entire communities. It also highlights the urgent need for a renewed harmony between humanity and the natural world, emphasizing sustainable water management and environmental awareness as key to our collective future.

If the climate crisis is not acknowledged and addressed as a truly global challenge, similar ecological disasters will likely occur. Still, there is hope that through shared responsibility and environmental stewardship, Lake Urmia could someday restore its former vitality — returning to its beautiful, life-giving waters once again.

For the past 35 years, people of Afghanistan continue to suffer from the ongoing war and its effects. After years of wars, most of the population of the country consists of crippled and uneducated people. International Security Aid Force (ISAF) plans to leave Afghanistan in the following days. Although war in Afghanistan seems to be over on paper, the presence of Taliban in southern and eastern regions of the country continues to delay the reconstruction of country. In this chaos, people of Afghanistan feel futureless and try to save the day. Look of pain is dominant on streets of Afghanistan. People seem to accept the insolubility and desperation of the situation… First thing to be recognized from these people without hope is the honorable and solemn stand.

The important strategic position of Afghanistan is the main reason of the 35 years of invasion. For countries that aim to rule the world politics, the geopolitical position of Afghanistan is more important than the daily life of children, rich cultural background and honorable history of this country.

In Afghanistan, it is possible to encounter several anachronistic scenes that resemble a stage of middle age… Slices of daily life that carry the effects of wartime, traditional animal fights and Afghan games that have dense heroic figures somewhat color the life.

The main aim of the documentary photograph, to understand an environment and reflecting it, is a hard task when it comes to a place of numerous dramatic stories like Afghanistan. This work, with a plain narrative of daily life, treats the struggle of the people of Afghanistan and the children of this geography that resists war and injustice.

Palmyra (Tadmur) is a magnificent heritage site, rising like an oasis in the heart of the Syrian desert and regarded as one of the most critical commercial and cultural crossroads of the ancient world. During the Roman Empire, this ancient city served as a hub on the Silk and Spice Routes, distinguished by a distinctive architectural style that fused Greco-Roman techniques with local Mesopotamian and Persian influences. With its colonnaded streets, monumental arches, and grand temples, Palmyra was not merely an architectural marvel but a vast site of memory where cultures intersected for centuries.

However, the Syrian Civil War, which began in 2011, deeply scarred this multilayered memory of Palmyra. The systematic destruction the city endured between 2015 and 2017 targeted global heritage symbols, including the Temples of Bel and Baalshamin, as well as the monumental Arch of Triumph. This process shattered more than just physical structures; it was a deliberate obliteration of the local population’s historical sense of belonging and collective memory.

Today, Palmyra continues to exist as a silent witness to the deep scars left by war, suspended in an uncertain future between the irreversibility of loss and ruins left to silence.

Rising from the ashes of the devastating 1870 Great Fire of Pera in contemporary Beyoğlu, Tarlabaşı was for over a century a distinctive residential enclave defined by its Levantine, Greek, and Armenian communities. Following the demographic upheavals that prompted these minorities to depart, the neighborhood’s historic masonry houses became a haven for internal migrants from Anatolia, later joined by Romani communities and African migrants. Tarlabaşı quickly evolved into the primary threshold for those pursuing metropolitan aspirations—a refuge where hopes of claiming Istanbul often collided with the harsh realities of urban marginalization.

This dense, layered fabric also gave birth to one of Istanbul’s most raw and unvarnished nocturnal ecosystems. Hidden in its narrow alleys, Tarlabaşı’s music halls survived as unique subterranean venues: spaces operating until dawn where live music and alcohol framed the precarious livelihoods of female and transgender sex workers. Far from the mainstream spectacle, these establishments served not only as nightlife spots, but as shared sanctuaries of survival, belonging, and solidarity for individuals pushed to the margins of society.

Today, under the pressure of extensive urban renewal and gentrification projects, this 150-year-old architectural and sociological tapestry is being methodically erased. As the neighborhood bids a silent farewell alongside its displaced residents, this body of work documents the last standing music hall on the verge of demolition—tracing the interplay of darkness and illumination, resilience and despair, beauty and transience in the twilight of an era.

On February 6, 2023, at 04:17 and 13:24 local time, earthquakes centered in Gaziantep with magnitudes of 7.8 and 7.7 occurred in Southern and Central Turkey as well as northern and western Syria. The impact of the earthquakes was strongly felt in the surrounding areas of Gaziantep and Antakya. These earthquakes resulted in extensive damage and tens of thousands of casualties.

The seismic activity extended over an area reaching Egypt and the Black Sea coast of Turkey. Subsequently, for three months, there were more than 30,000 aftershocks.

Extensive damage occurred within a 350,000 km² (140,000 square miles) area. An estimated 14 million people were adversely affected by these earthquakes, with development experts from the United Nations estimating that approximately 1.5 million people were left homeless.

The confirmed death toll is 50,783 in Turkey and 8,476 in Syria. This stands as the deadliest earthquake and natural disaster in contemporary Turkey. Moreover, it is the most lethal earthquake in present-day Syria since the Aleppo earthquake of 1822.